"There are two important things going on here, one is that the capital isn't going to last forever, especially since shale gas is a commercial failure. Shale gas has lost hundreds of billions of dollars and investors will not keep on pumping money into something that doesn't generate a return. The second thing that nobody thinks very much about is the decline rates shale reservoirs experience. Well, I've looked at this. The decline rates are incredibly high."

"However, Professors Heinemann and Carman warn, there's a risk that the gene silencing done to these plants might make its way into humans and wreak havoc on our bodies. In their press conference and subsequent papers, they describe the possibility that the siRNA molecules – which are pretty hardy little chemicals and not easily gotten rid of – could wind up interacting with our RNA."

Security exercises at Indian Point
"Entergy will be conducting security training drills at the Indian Point nuclear power plant during part of the day and evening on Tuesday and Wednesday, November 13 and 14 using simulated weaponry that sounds like actual gunfire, Entergy announced."

There's no shortage of articles ridiculing preppers as half-crazed "doomers" or wild-eyed "conspiracy theorists" screaming incoherently from grassy knolls (OK, some of them might be crazy, but rational people can easily see what's happening). At the same time, preparations are being made for mock zombieattacks, so the authorities too are getting ready for something big. However, holing up in a bunker is not recommended. As the industrial/consumer society crumbles bit by bit, it's important that we form mutually supportive communities that will salvage what we can from the old in order to build the new. -- RF

Our understanding of the "city" is incomplete unless we consider also the underlying ethos of urban culture, which is to exploit the ecologically viable portions of the planet in order to achieve ever higher levels of extravagance and maintain their suicidal expansion. Cities will perforce downsize, but the mindset that underlies them must also change, otherwise there will be no end to the emperors, kings, dictators, bosses, and various other elites and aristocrats. -- RF

Worries over highly radioactive fish prompt study
"Persistently high radioactivity in some fish caught close to the Fukushima nuclear plant has sparked a government investigation into the physiological basis for contamination and why radiation readings in some specimens remain hundreds of times over the official safe limit."

Won't happen. Like Japan's plan for a maglev train line snaking from Tokyo to Osaka, the planners can't see that expensive energy and rapidly evaporating capital will be the death of their dreams. -- RF